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Tuesday, November 27, 2012

‘Thoko,’ I said, ‘What are you
learning at school nowadays? Anything interesting?’

‘It’s all so boring,’ she sighed. ‘Especially
Civics. All this stuff about the constitution, the executive, parliament, judiciary,
and so on. I’m beginning to think the whole thing was invented just to make the
Grade Nine exams more difficult!’

‘So how would you make things more
simple?’

‘I’d just put a king in charge of everything.
Or better still, myself as queen!’

‘But hasn’t your teacher told you the
cautionary tale of King Atas?’

‘No, who was he?’

‘King Atas lived long ago, when it was
quite normal for the country to be ruled by a king. In those days they didn’t
bother about a parliament or ministers or anything like that.’

‘So there was only one person to steal
money from the people?’

‘Exactly,’ I agreed.

‘Ha ha!’ she laughed, clapping her
hands. ‘Now you see why a king would be better!’

‘But in those days,’ I cautioned, ‘everybody
had to do exactly as the king said, because he held all the power.’

‘But wasn’t it the people that gave
him that power?’

‘Good gracious no,’ I said. ‘The power
was given to him by God. Therefore the king’s word was law. His judgement was
final. His power was absolute.’

‘And was King Atas a good king?’ Thoko
wondered.

‘He started off alright,’ I admitted, ‘although rather annoyingly noisy and bossy. When he banged his
spoon on the dining table and shouted Bring
me more ice-cream, a servant had to bring it quick, otherwise he’d be
fired, with immediate effect.

‘That’s just how little Nawiti shouts
for ice-cream,’ laughed Thoko.

‘But it’s a much bigger problem when
the king does it,’ I said.

‘There was nobody to control him,’
laughed Thoko, ‘because he was the one in control of everybody else.’

‘That’s not the only problem,’ I said.
‘A king is always surrounded by a coterie of flatterers and sycophants, who incite
and encourage him, saying You can order
anything O King, Your word is law. One day King Atas went so far as
ordering an elephant to be brought to him, even though elephants are
notoriously difficult to catch. When no elephant was brought within five
minutes, he sacked all the game rangers.’

‘With immediate effect,’ suggested
Thoko.

‘Of course. Another time he ordered
the rain to stop, and when it didn’t, he fired all the meteorologists.’

‘Did he ever have any successes?’ laughed
Thoko.

‘Oh yes, King Atas will always remain famous
for his miracle of restoring water to the Holy Well at Ultimate Termination
House.’

‘What sort of house was that?’

‘It was the most
important place in the land. The UTH was where everybody went to die. The Holy
Well contained the Holy Water for the Holy Sacrament of washing the bodies of
the dead before being taken to Heaven. So a shortage of water would have been an
insult to God.’

‘But King Atas managed to restore the
water?’

‘The miracle is recorded in the scriptures.
He just stood in front of the well and said In the name God and the King I order this well to supply water! Immediately
there was a loud gurgling noise, as water rose up in the well and overflowed
onto the ground. Whereupon the assembled crowd fell to their knees and raised
their hands to Heaven.’

‘So now people had confidence in the
king’s power?’

‘Exactly. And even the king himself
was now confident that he could successfully order anything. The very next day
he ordered six palaces to be built throughout the country, so that he could
visit all his people and perform more miracles. But the people murmured that
they needed food and not palaces.

‘The next day King Atas ordered a huge
40,000 capacity football stadium to be built in Shang’ombo. But there were
murmurs that there were only 4,000 people in Shang’ombo and they didn’t even have
a football club.

‘The next day King Atas ordered that an
Atlantic cruise liner to be brought up the Zambezi, so that he could travel in
a suitably regal style when visiting the remote and neglected Western
Hinterland of his vast empire.’

‘Why couldn’t he travel by road?’
wondered Thoko.

‘In those days, long ago,’ I
explained, ‘there were hardly any roads and the horse had not yet been invented.’

‘The next day King Atas ordered a
university to be built in every village, so that the next generation could all become
doctors and lawyers so that they would never have to be farmers like their unfortunate
parents.

‘And the very next next day King Atas
ordered a tall tower to be built at his palace, so that he could stand on top to
inspect progress on all his new development projects. But when he climbed the
tower he found that he could see no further than
Kalingalinga. Then his flatterers and
bootlickers encouraged him, saying Just
fly over the country, O King. Flap your arms and fly! You can do miracles! You
have the power and glory of God! You are the King!’

‘And did he manage to fly?’ asked
Thoko.

‘Oh yes,’ I replied, ‘He flew straight
to Heaven.’

‘So after that,’ said Thoko, ‘did the
people decide to have a constitution?’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘They introduced a new
system, with a parliament to control expenditure, a judiciary to control the
executive, and a church to perform miracles.’

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

‘No,’ I said, ‘I can definitely see
something. Look carefully. I think there’s a woman in a red dress sitting in
front of a red wall hung with red pictures and red curtains!’

As Sara peered forward, a notice
appeared at the bottom of the red screen saying The Honourable Ms Emery Chimbusu, Minister for Local Government and Toilets.
‘You see!’ I cried in triumph, ‘There is somebody there!’

Sure enough, to prove me right, a set
of white teeth appeared in the middle of the red wall, and began speaking. ‘I
am pleased to inform you that tomorrow this nation will be taking part in the
global commemoration of World Toilet Day.’

‘Poof,’ sneered Sara, ‘this is just a
load of sh…’

‘Shush,’ I said. ‘This is a crucial
aspect of developing our great nation...’

‘No house is complete,’ began the Honorable
Ms Emery Chimbusu, ‘without a toilet. This is a matter on which we must all
take action. Do not sit idly in front of your TV this evening. Jump up now,
inspect your house and find out if your house has got a toilet!’

‘I’ve always wondered,’ I said to
Sara, ‘about that big white vase where we planted the geraniums. Maybe that was
supposed to be a toilet?’

‘Surely not,’ Sara laughed, ‘A
chimbusu should be flat on the floor, not sitting up like a big flower pot.’

‘It’s a great pity,’ I said, ‘that the
Minister didn’t think to illustrate her little talk with some pictures and
diagrams, so that we might know what she’s talking about.’

‘If you cannot find a proper toilet in
your house,’ the Minister for Toilets announced sternly, ‘this almost certainly
means that you have been answering the call of nature in a wrong and unhygienic
place. Some negligent and uncaring people are even known to be using plastic
bags or cooking oil containers, with a view to emptying the contents over their
political opponents and without police permission.’

‘That’s why we need the Public Order
Act,’ I said, ‘to prevent all this shit flying around.’

‘That’s why the police have to wear
helmets, visors and rubber boots, and hide behind those huge transparent shields,’
said Sara. ‘They have to protect themselves from flying lumps of cholera.’

‘Other furtive
defecators,’ explained the Minister, ‘travel long distances to secret places to
answer the call of nature, thereby exposing their most tender and vulnerable extremities
to the depredation of wild animals, or even worse, to members of the
opposition. This is most unhealthy.’

‘I am now
beginning to understand why the police have to ban these so-called political rallies,’
I admitted. ‘These unfortunate social misfits are actually large congregations of
nomadic crappers, looking for a site where they can unburden themselves, with
the unintended consequence of spreading cholera instead of political ideas.

‘But the normal
human function of defecation,’ continued the Minister for Toilets, ‘is supposed
to be a moment for private reflection rather than public entertainment. That is
why, under the government’s privatization policy, each individual householder is
encouraged to build their own private facility.’

‘There’s privatization
policy for you,’ said Sara. ‘The government won’t build public toilets.’

‘If people get together
in public toilets,’ I suggested, ‘they might crap all over the government.’

‘Figures from
the 2009 Demographic Toilet Survey,’ continued the minister, ‘indicate that we
have only 762 toilets in a population of 13 million people.’

‘And half of
those toilets must be in State House!’ I suggested.

‘Why do you
think that?’ Sara wondered.

‘Because,’ I said,
‘the ruling class have to endure so many banquets, causing them to visit the
toilet ten times a day, or even more frequently after feasts provided by the
Indian High Commission. But your average villager, with starvation and constipation, only needs to go twice a year. The villager’s main expense is
funerals, not toilets.’

‘We must realize,’
intoned Ms Chimbusu solemnly, ‘that the politics of toilets go back to the very
beginning of the demand for social equality, and to the popular rallying cry of
the freedom movement, One Man, One Toilet!’

‘She means One Person,
One Toilet!’ Sara shouted.

‘Oh no she doesn’t,’
I hooted. ‘She means One Man, Four Wives,
Thirty-five Children and One Toilet!’

‘Or Forty Prisoners and One Bucket!’ Sara
hissed.

‘So I hereby declare,’
announced Ms Emery Chimbusu, ‘that my government will commemorate World Toilet
Day by building a million toilets. The government will make toilet building grants
available to all householders and will also expand the sewer system nationwide.
In line with our action oriented approach, my government undertakes to complete
this programme within ninety days!

‘Furthermore,’
announced Ms Emery, ‘this new National Toilet Initiative will provide a new means
for distributing information on government programmes. By tomorrow, a copy of my
speech will be hung on the wall of every toilet in the nation.’

‘Ha ha!’ I
exclaimed, ‘this new programme will immediately be flushed down the toilet!
That will make it a first!’

‘No it won't,’
said Sara. ‘It will make it a fourth!’

‘A fourth?’ I
frowned. ‘Which were the others?’

‘First the Manifesto
went down the toilet, and after that the Freedom of Information Act. As we
speak the Draft Constitution is already going the same way. So the Toilet Initiative will be the fourth!’

‘No, it’s a
first!’ I declared, raising my arms in triumph. ‘This is the first time that
the toilet has been flushed down the toilet!’

Tuesday, November 13, 2012

It was Sunday afternoon, and Sara and I
were having a quiet cup of tea on the veranda when we heard a voice behind us.
‘Have you got a cup for me”

‘Christine!’
exclaimed Sara, rising to give her a hug. ‘So you really did get out of there! Congrats!
Good on you my dear! Long overdue!’

‘Had a row with
Michael?’ I wondered, as I poured Christine a cup of tea.

‘No no,’ she
said, as she made herself comfortable, ‘there was nothing like that, Michael never
misbehaves. He washes properly and always irons his own shirts. He’s such a
sweetie. He’s my darling.’

‘That’s not what
I see on TV,’ I laughed. ‘He’s always scowling and growling, huffing and
puffing, hiring and firing and hissing and dissing.’

‘By the end of
the day he’s exhausted ,’ Christine explained, ‘so by the time he gets back to
me he’s a pussy cat. The problem is not Michael, the problem is State House. When we were in
Rhodes Park it was just us and the children, but State House, it’s like living
in a railway station. People tramping in and out all the time. Sometimes they
even trample on me and don’t seem to notice.’

‘They’re not
very nice people?’

‘That’s another
thing,’ said Christine, as she plastered her scone with strawberry jam, ‘he’s
got such a peculiar bunch of friends. It was alright when he met them in the
National Assembly Motel Bar, but now they’re in my house!’

‘And in the
government,’ I said.

‘I can’t stand
that awful GBV,’ said Christine, ‘he’s a real menace.’

‘You mean GBM,’
I suggested.

‘I know what I
mean,’ she replied grimly. ‘I used to work at the hospital.’

‘But surely you
must like poor old Dotty Scotty?’ I suggested.

‘He seems quite
harmless,’ admitted Christine, ‘but he’s a terrible nuisance. Once I found him
weeping in the toilet at three o’clock in the morning. Apparently he’d got lost
and couldn’t find the way out.’

‘But surely you
must enjoy all those big parties,’ I said. ‘Like Heroes Day when they bring out
all the dead heroes and everybody gets drunk.’

‘Party cadres
belching and farting and vomiting everywhere. After the last one we had to go
to Japan for a couple of weeks while the place was being fumigated.’

‘I knew it!’ I
cried in triumph. ‘The Watchdog was right! Your darling sweetie Michael was
cheating on you! You had to leave him!’

‘What!’ laughed
Christine. ‘Michael has never cheated on me! My dear Michael! Never! Michael is
not a womaniser! He’s not even a polygamist! He’s a serial monogamist!’

Sara scowled at
me. ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about. Can you please just be quiet and
listen to what Christine is trying to tell you?’

‘I believed all
these rumours,’ I persisted. ‘I really thought you’d run away from Michael!’

‘Of course not!’
she laughed. ‘I would never run away from Michael! I’ve run away from State
House!’

‘But why?’

‘I couldn’t
stand being First Lady,’ said Christine, as her lips trembled and a tear ran down
her face. Sara handed her a handkerchief.

‘There there,’ I
said, putting my arm around her. ‘We all know it’s a silly job. But it’s a
national duty. Somebody’s got to do it.’

‘All that
opening of workshops,’ she sobbed, ‘attending traditional ceremonies or gluttonous
banquets for indigestible dignitaries. It’s all so mindless, irritating and boring.’

‘Dotty Scotty
doesn’t seem to mind,’ I said soothingly.

‘He’s an old man
with nothing else to do,’ she sobbed. ‘I’m a young professional with promising
career prospects! I’ve got a mind of my own! But I’ve been spending half my
time reading speeches that I haven’t written, saying things that I don’t agree
with, to people who aren’t listening. I’ve
been spending all my time smiling at people I don’t like.’

‘You have to
support your man,’ I said.

‘Christine’s
right, of course,’ Sara declared firmly. ‘As First Lady she had position
without power. Her job was merely to glorify the power of the husband and the
subordination of his wife. He was the master and she was his servant. She did
not represent us women, but instead was made to represent men’s view of
womanhood. She was purposely disempowered in order to make an example for the
rest of us. An example of how to accept being downtrodden.’

‘Sounds very
eloquent,’ I sneered, ‘but all Christine has actually done is to run away from her
husband!’

‘Nonsense,’
snapped Christine. ‘My next project is to help my beloved Michael to also
escape. He is trapped in there by a bunch of sharks and criminals, even though
he’s well past retirement age. So next Tuesday I’m going back to State House under
the pretext of receiving a donation of useless books, then I’m going to get him
out through the tunnels.’

‘Have you
thought this through?’ I sneered. ‘Do you realize that if you rescue our dear
Michael from State House then the gang of sharks and criminals will take over,
and the nation will plunge into rack and ruin?

‘Of course we’ve
thought of that,’ snapped Christine. ‘Plans for the transition are well advanced.
We plan to make Sara the next President and you, Kalaki, will be her First
Gentleman!’

‘But,’ warned
Sara, ‘don’t write about this in the newspaper!’

‘Doesn’t matter
if he does,’ laughed Christine. ‘Nobody believes a word he says!’

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Monday evening, and Sara and I had
settled down in front of the TV. ‘We now take you over to Mufumbwe,’ said
Master Chambala. ‘Sensitive viewers should turn off their TVs.’

‘Ooh, I do love the Freak Show News,’ I
declared. ‘They bring us such horrible stories.’

‘My God!’gasped Sara, as the TV picture
showed the main street of a small threadbare town in the middle of nowhere. ‘That
place can’t have changed since colonial times!’

‘It’s changed a lot,’ I laughed. ‘Fifty
years ago it had bright shiny steel roofs, but now they’ve all gone rusty.’

As we were talking the camera was
focusing on a rising cloud of dust in the distance. Suddenly, out of this dust appeared
a speeding convoy of Landcruisers with sirens wailing and green flags flying, finally
coming to a screeching halt in the middle of the empty street. On the top of a
gold-plated Landcruiser was the Royal Pabwata of King Ukwa, and sitting in the
boat was the King himself, resplendent in his official ceremonial gold silk
Chinese suit.

The King rose slowly and regally to
address the crowd. There wasn’t one. Quickly his coterie of sycophants and goons
leapt out of their vehicles and began waving brown envelopes and green chitenges,
and a few people began to cautiously venture out from behind their closed
doors. In the meantime, the King’s chauffeur connected the battery of the
Golden Royal Lancruiser to a microphone, which he then handed to the King.

‘This must be the first time they’ve
seen electricity,’ said Sara.

‘It’ll soon be gone again,’ I sighed.

King Ukwa was now standing in his Royal
Pabwato scowling angrily at a motley crowd of about fifty people, mostly old
people and small children, all very thin and wearing rags.

‘I have brought you your candidate!’
he shouted. Then, turning to one of his goons in black suit and dark glasses,
he shouted ‘What have you done with my candidate?’

As he spoke, two goons rushed forward
dragging a small thin fellow with vacant uncoordinated rolling eyes and a loose
mouth which dripped saliva. ‘What’s your name?’ shouted the King.

‘Musumbi, O King,’ whined the little
fellow.

‘Mushula!’ shouted the King. ‘Kneel
before your constituents.’

‘This is your new member of
parliament,’ the King shouted at the sullen gathering. ‘Vote for him and you’ll
all be rich! Vote for the other party and you’ll die in poverty! Any questions?’

‘Yes,’ shouted an old woman. ‘We’re
all dying of thirst! There’s no water in the river!’

‘You don’t have to tell me that there’s
no water in the river,’ shouted the King angrily. ‘Can’t you see that I had to
bring my Royal Pabwato all the way by road because there is no water in the
river? I have been inconvenienced far more than you!’

‘Why is there no water in the river?’ persisted
the old woman.

‘Because you voted for the wrong party
last time!’ shouted the King angrily. ‘That’s why you’ve got no development
here! That’s why I’m giving you a second chance by bringing you this Mushula!’

‘Musumbi,’ said the goon.

‘His name is Pabwato,’ shouted the
King, ‘that’s what matters.’

‘He looks a bit simple,’ said a voice
from the back.

‘That’s why he’s representing you,’
shouted the king angrily. ‘You’re all a bit simple, that’s why you keep voting
for the wrong party! That’s why you voted for the Movement for Mental
Deficiency instead of Pabwato Fiasco!’

‘But why is there no water in the
river?’ repeated the old woman.

‘You all know very well why you’ve got
no water!’ replied the King angrily. ‘You’ve got no water because you live
downstream from Chuminga, which had the sense to vote for me in the last
election. So I have brought them development. I have built a dam for the Ching
Chang rice plantation which will export rice to China. I have built a dam for
the Fing Fang Fong Fish Farm and another dam for the Die Soon Crocodile Farm.’

‘Is there no water left over?’

‘Yes, plenty,’ smirked the King. ‘The
excess water has been diverted to the leach plant at Kansanshi Mine, to make
copper so that one day I shall be able to bring you electricity.’

‘When?’ said the old woman
suspiciously.

‘After you have voted for Mushula,’
said the King.

‘Musumbi,’ groaned the goon.

‘Let me explain the situation in
simple terms,’ growled the King. ‘Supposing you had only one cup of water left
in your house, would you give that water to your own child or to a stranger?’

‘We all need water!’ shouted the old
woman.

‘Development is about choices,’
sneered the King. ‘And the choice is yours. Vote Pabwato and I shall bring you
water!’

‘Wrong way round!’ retorted the old
woman. ‘Bring us water and we shall vote Pabwato!’ But as she was shouting six goons
jumped on her and used their batons to beat her to the ground, and the
remainder of the motley crowd ran away screaming.

‘My God!’ I said to Sara. ‘What’s
happening?’

‘She’s committed a serious offence
under the Public Order Act,’ Sara explained. ‘She’s protesting without a
permit.’

­­­­­­_____________________________

Friday evening TV News, and at last
the announcement of the results: ‘In the Mufumbwe by-election the MMD
candidate, Mr Stalwart Mulunshi, has won by a stunning margin of 8,549 votes,
with the Pabwato candidate, Mr Simple Musumbi, scoring a perfect zero.’

‘That means,’ I said, ‘that he didn’t
even vote for himself.’

‘Perhaps he was so intellectually
challenged,’ laughed Sara, ‘that he forgot to register to vote.’